Militias--too glib?

[Katha Pollitt]

p.s. I mean : Justin says he thinks we should not "dismiss" them as
fullblown SS cadres but "understand" them. I don't think I argued
against understanding them. Understanding is always good.  One can also 
understand something first, and then dismiss it. It's doesn't take a
brain scientist to connect the militias and Tim mcVeigh=style
freelancers with the declining position of the industrial working class,
farmers losing their land, white working-class men feeling squeezed by
blacks and women, etc etc. Same with the Pat buchanan followers -- isn't
this what everyone says?

   What bothers me with Alex Cockburn is that i think he actually likes
them -- he likes the gun fetishism, the macho Western Wild Man thing,
the rejection of liberal pussyfooting and "pwogwessive" values (his
term). And he has a whole fantasy going in which the People, through
jury nullification, resist the State.  Meanwhile, he has nothing but
contempt for people --socialist feminists, say -- who have been on the
left for decades.  At least in his case, the fascination with the
militias functions as an acceptable way to put white men in the center
again, and to resurrect some of the most awful aspects of pre-feminist
masculinity. 

best, katha